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Clam Soup

A creamy soup made with clams, milk, potatoes, onions, butter, flour, parsley, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Drain the chopped clams in a colander.

  2. Pare and chop the potatoes finely.

Make the soup

  1. In a pot, combine the potatoes and onions with the milk and boil for 15 minutes.

  2. Mix the butter and flour until creamy, then add to the pot and cook for 8 more minutes.

  3. Stir in the parsley, salt, pepper, and a dash of nutmeg, and cook for an additional 3 minutes.

  4. Add the clams and bring to a boil, then remove from heat and serve.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Parsley + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main seafood flavor and the character of the soup.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the soup and gives it a creamy body.
Potatoes
Add starch and body, helping the soup feel thick and substantial.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavor and smoothing the texture.
Flour
Thickens the milk as it heats, giving the soup a creamy consistency.

The step that matters

Adding the clams and bringing to a boil. Clams become tough and rubbery when overcooked. Adding them at the end and heating only until they open and the soup is hot helps keep them tender.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, milk, butter, parsley, potato, flour, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, milk, butter, parsley, potato, flour, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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